This one was never handled by postal service personnel.

[Nick Colley]

But I'll show it anyway:

This has never seen any sort of postal delivery in the usual sense. There is a wax seal on the back with the letters RN impressed in it, so we can assume the obvious origin, I think. However, without a date, we can't pin down the circumstances with any confidence. However, a quick scan of the internet has yielded a potted history of the USS [i]Osmond Ingram[/i]. She was a destroyer (of some vintage, launched in 1919), and spent the early part of the war in the West Indies, and then in the eastern Pacific working off the coast of Ecuador. It seems unlikely that this item would originate from this time. However, later in 1942 she joined a hunter-killer group in the Atlantic, centred on the US carrier [i]Bogue[/i]. I have yet to learn more of her time here. A change of role saw her participating in operations on the French Mediterranean coast in August 1944. She was in-theatre here until late December 1944 when she was transferred back to the US, and subsequently the Pacific theatre. At present, then, it seems perhaps more likely that the ship would have had more contact with RN vessels while she was operating in the western Med between August and December 1944. That would be my tentative estimate of the time period for this item.

chrs
N

[Alan Baker]

I have come across this ship before, either mail to it or from it, but the chances of me finding the item are extremely remote. If I do come across it, I will post it on this thread